Harper: Govt could have stopped strike misery months ago Lib Dems call for Partygate conduct inquiry in ethics advisor's 'first test' in post Harper: Govt could have stopped strike misery months ago Responding to Mark Harper on Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg indicating he is hopeful for a deal to resolve the rail strikes, Liberal Democrat Cabinet Office Spokesperson Christine Jardine MP said: This Government has spent months dithering, delaying and refusing to get around the table to resolve strike action. Millions of people have suffered upheaval and still, the Government won't set out a timetable for resolution. All of these ...
While writing my recent posts on Softly Softly: Task Force I've had at the back of my mind a memory of reading that Frank Windsor, who played Barlow's sidekick John Watt, and his wife had lived in a commune with Shirley Williams and her then husband, the philosopher Bernard Williams. It sounds unlikely, but it turns out to be two-thirds true. Shirley and Bernard Williams shared a house in Holland Park with the publisher Hilary Rubinstein and his wife Helge for 14 years. Part of the house was let as a flat, and the tenants were Frank and Mary Windsor. ...
Sun 15th
20:34
Do two-thirds of people really want a referendum on rejoining the EU? - The Week in Polls
The latest edition of my weekly political polling round-up, The Week in Polls, is out. As it says: That was the headline recently in The Independent. What should we make of that claim? Find out more by reading this edition of The Week in Polls here, and you can sign up below to receive future editions direct to your email inbox:
Embed from Getty ImagesStephen Unwin in Byline Times quotes Virginia Woolf's for Sunday 9 January 1915. She and her husband Leonard had been out for a "very good walk" along the Thames towpath from Richmond to Kingston, when they encountered "a long line of imbeciles": "The first was a very tall man, just queer enough to look at twice, but no more; the second shuffled, and looked aside; and then one realised that everyone in that long line was a miserable, ineffective, shuffling, idiotic creature with no forehead, or no chin, and an imbecile grin, or a wild suspicious stare. ...
City on a hill: built by fire and axe and loss; haunted by extremes
The current crisis in the NHS should be persuading us to re-consider the idea of a 10 per cent retirement levy to pay for social care. Everyone knows that bed- blocking is at the root of the over-crowding in our hospitals and the long waits for ambulances and in accident and emergency departments. But "delayed discharge" cannot be solved without more resources in home care and nursing homes. Massively more resources. The lack of political courage over this issue is shameful, from all parties. Back in 2011, the Dilmot Report called for something to be done. Since then, Andy Burnham's ...
Fears are growing for the jailed Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny whose health is deteriorating with chills, fever and severe cough. In a brave show of force, some five hundred Russian doctors have signed an open letter to Vladimir Putin demanding an end to the 'abuse of Alexei Navalny'. Alexi Navalny, 46, has long been the most prominent face of Russian opposition. Even from prison, he and his team had been mapping out a road map for the emergence of a democratic, modern Russia after Putin goes. On Thursday evening, in a Liberal Democrat European Group webinar debate, I will ...
In October it was announced that Steve Gibbons was to get his due: a star on Broad Street's celebrated Walk of Stars in Birmingham. Jim Simpson, the former Black Sabbath manager and a local impresario, told Birmingham World: "Steve Gibbons has been at the heart of rock music in this city, almost since the very beginning, and this 'Star' is a much-deserved tribute to his life and work." You can read about Gibbons's Sixties career in The Uglys on the Brumbeat site. Here, with the Steve Gibbons Band, he does Dylan. He introduces his bandmates - notably Trevor Burton from ...
With the end of another, rather interesting, quarter, another update to PollBase, my database of British voting intention opinion polls since 1943 is now up. This time, as well as another quarter of polls, the update includes the first fruits of my new search through newspaper archives. Already that's produced a large increase in the number of polls known about for the 1950-51 Parliament. Enjoy! P.S. For the very latest polls, see my polling scorecard and for the history of polls, how to spot the good from the bad and what the future holds for opinion polling, see my book, ...
Boris Johnson is letting us know that he is neither going to stand down from Parliament nor seek a safer seat. Instead, he will restand in his current constituency: Sources close to Mr Johnson reportedly confirmed the former PM's intention to run again for the seat where he has been the MP since 2015. But with allies of Mr Johnson still pushing for him to oust Mr Sunak, perhaps after local elections in May, there has been speculation that he may need to find a seat with a bigger Conservative majority. [Evening Standard] But as it's Boris Johnson, perhaps we ...
The NHS is once again in the news and not in a good way. It is fast becoming a basket case with ambulances unable to deliver critically ill patients to hospital in anything like acceptable times, operations often delayed with unacceptable waiting times, people unable to make GP appointments and now a series of strikes because the Tory Government cries crocodile tears instead of funding the NHS and its staff properly. There is a dangerous myth that has been around in our politics for far too long that the public sector is inefficient and that as much of it as ...
Avenbury Properties Ltd has submitted an application for a building destined to be a M&S Food Hall on the other side of the A49 (22/05682/FUL). Proposed development [is] to provide a 2016.8sqm retail unit, with a net trading area of 1,398sqm, with access road from Sheet Road, 180 space car park to include 7 disabled parking bays, 7 parent and child parking bays, 8 electric vehicle charging bays, cycle rack service yard, and landscaping. The store will create 70 full and part time jobs. With a sales area of around 1,400sqm, the store will be two-thirds the size of Sainsbury's, ...
Sat, 12:56: So, it turns out that F. Scott Fitzgerald was my fifth cousin three times removed. Sat, 17:22: Spotlight (2015) https://t.co/DtKbSE3Nkg I liked the fact that the film portrays its protagonists as hard workers rather than heroes. Sat, 20:48: A moving farewell from a friend of several friends. https://t.co/F55PAFGGpI Sun, 10:45: The benefits of Russia's coming disintegration https://t.co/jF3Rt4vExZ Thought-provoking from @JBugajskiUSA!
United States The Kevin McCarthy election fiasco will have far-reaching consequences for Speaker McCarthy, Donald Trump, the Republican Party, the conduct of US government and the rest of the world. Let's start with Mr. Trump. He endorsed Mr McCarthy. The "Never Kevins" in the far-right Republican Freedom Caucus ignored him. The voters ignored his key endorsements in the mid-term elections. Trump's star is still in the firmament, but on the wane. Now for the Republican Party. The battle to secure McCarthy's election exposed a split. A small group of 20 right-wing extremists were able to delay and nearly blocked the ...
The Brecon and Radnor Express reports that land at Gilestone Farm, purchased last year by the Welsh Government for £4.25m to accommodate the Green Man Festival and other events, has flooded, following this week's period of heavy rain. The paper implies that this flooding is a regular occurrence, which is why concerns are being expressed that the transaction went ahead without a full business plan, with no prior ministerial visits to the site and with no advice taken from the music industry to see if the site was appropriate. The local community council is concerned that the owners of Green ...
Dundee University Swing Dance is continuing the academic year with a new semester of classes and share the joy of swing dancing with you. This class will be a taster of swing dance, perfectly suited to those new to swing or even new to dancing. It is also a great chance for the more experienced dancers among us to brush up on the basics and get back into the 'swing' of things! All welcome - and find out more at www.facebook.com/DUSwingDance
